Tips for running a successful European project

To win and successfully complete a European Commission project (H2020, Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions, etc.) implies a lot of work and coordination. Proposal preparation is notorious for the amount of effort needed in a short period of time. Running the project does not perhaps require such burst of efforts but, nevertheless, includes a lot of hard work, and the risks of ‘getting it wrong’ are numerous.
Read more

ESF has a long track record as a home base for expert boards, committees and virtual institutes, having set up and/or hosted several since 1974, in diverse scientific domains including space sciences, radio-astronomy frequencies, nuclear physics, marine and polar sciences, and materials science. Today through its Community of Experts, ESF continues to gather...
Read more

One of the new activities of ESF is conducting Research Grant and Institutional evaluations. In this post, the first in a series about key concepts in peer review, ESF shares some of its 40+ years of expertise in the peer review process, and explains the concept of a “peer” in the context of an ESF-led peer review call management.
Read more

This blog post is the first in a series of informal dialogues around issues in space sciences, between two of our in-house scientists: Dr. Jean-Claude Worms, our CEO, and Dr. Emmanouil Detsis, one of our Science Officers. The discussions will range from technical to philosophical, and although both authors are advocates of space exploration, they approach...
Read more

The MERIL-2 project launched a beta-version of the new MERIL portal in Rome on the 20th of June, 2017, in its first public event, which welcomed a diverse group of research infrastructure (RI) stakeholders.
Read more

Some time ago, ESF and its partners concluded work on the DEMOCRITOS project. It has been quite an interesting two-year effort. DEMOCRITOS is/was an EC H2020 Space-funded Coordination and Support action, with the aim of exploring the high-level design of demonstrators necessary for the realization of a nuclear electric propulsion-based spacecraft, in the...
Read more

The title of this post is adapted from Mariana Mazzucato’s book “The Entrepreneurial State,” published in 2013, and in which she successfully – at least in my view – debunks a number myths that modern capitalism has impressed upon most of us concerning the role of private entrepreneurs in innovation. I am attempting below to link that discussion with the...
Read more

Strasbourg is a great place in which to work and live! This historic city is over 2000 years old, and boasts one of the most beautiful gothic cathedrals in Europe. It is home to several international institutions and has been the European Capital since the Second World War.
The city is regularly in the limelight – it knows how to stand out! European,...
Read more

Launched in October 2016, the career tracking project has completed its crucial phase of questionnaire design and survey preparation. After having been open for one month (14/03-13/04), this online survey collected over 2000 complete responses, which represents on average 24% of all those who received the survey invitation.
Read more

The European Science Foundation has placed its new services division Science Connect in a safe orbit on 3 April 2017, opening up thereby a new period of ESF support to the European Research Area.
Read more